DETROIT, MI-General Motors Co. plans to add thousands of information technology jobs across the U.S.

The Detroit-based automaker today said it plans to initially hire upwards of 2,000 software developers, project managers, database experts, business analysts and other information technology professionals at four or so new IT Innovation Centers in an effort to “insource” its U.S. IT operations.

GM has already opened the first center with a “handful” of people in Austin, Texas, where it plans to hire up to 500 new employees, officials announced today. Locations for the other centers have not been finalized, according to GM.

Randy Mott, the company's new chief information officer, said GM could add as many as 10,000 people to do the work globally in the next three to five years.

“We are really trying to drive the innovation and development capability of IT inside of GM,” Mott said during a media conference call Friday morning.

The new centers are intended to drive breakthrough ideas into GM vehicles and business processes globally.

Mott, who joined GM in February, said 90 percent of GM's IT operations are currently handled by about 10,000 people outside the company. In the next five years or so, Mott wants to flip those percentages to have 90 percent be GM employees.

“We’d like to be a long ways there in three years, but realistically it’s probably over a five-year timeframe,” he said, adding initial hiring at each new U.S. facility should be around 500 people.

Austin, Mott said, was chosen for the first center because the city already has 46,000 people with the skills the company is seeking, according to the May 2011 Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment Report. T

The Austin-area also is home to a growing high-tech community that includes the University of Texas at Austin and Dell Inc., which Mott previously worked for as senior
vice president and chief information officer.

Mott said GM plans to announce where the other U.S. facilities will be located in the next year.